Maurice Bodman

Memorial: South Gloucestershire war dead not on a local memorial

Regiment: Gloucestershire Regiment

Medals: 1914–15 Star, British War Medal, Next of Kin Memorial Plaque 1914 - 1921, Silver War Badge, Victory Medal

Rank and number: Private 28712

Parents: Eliza and George Bodman

Marital status: Married

Home address: North Street, Oldland Common, Bristol

Pre-war occupation: General Labourer

Date of birth: 1884

Place of birth: Oldland Common, Bristol

Date of death: 16/02/1917

Buried/Commemorated at: No known burial site but commemorated at Basra Memorial Iraq. Not commemorated on a local memorial.

Age: 32

Further information:

Maurice was born in Oldland Common, the son of an agricultural labourer. His mother was a paper maker and she was widowed at a young age. Maurice was the youngest child of seven children with four sisters and two brothers. He married Emma in June 1913 and together they had two girls, Lauretta and Iris who were aged three and one years, respectively, when Maurice died.

Maurice enlisted in December 1915 and mobilised with the Expeditionary Force to Mesopotamia at the beginning of June 1916 where he would have fought in the Battles of Kut Al Imara which was a costly British defeat. The British forces regrouped at the end of 1916, re-commencing their march on Baghdad. Maurice last saw action during the Capture of The Dahra Bend (9th - 15th February 1915) a British victory, when he was reported as missing on the 10th of February 1917. His body was never found and his records were changed to presumed killed in action, after he had been missing for 6 days. The Basra Memorial where he is remembered, commemorates more than 40,500 members of the Commonwealth forces who died in the operations in Mesopotamia from the Autumn of 1914 to the end of August 1921 and whose graves are not known.

Maurice served with the 7th Battalion, Gloucestershire Regiment.

By kind permission, this information is based on the following source(s):

This information has been provided by Sarah Hands, Volunteer Researcher for the South Gloucestershire War Memorials Web Site.
By kind permission, this information is based on the following source(s):
https://www.cwgc.org/
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/
https://www.findmypast.co.uk/
https://www.forces-war-records.co.uk/
Some information supplied by Kingswood Heritage Museum